


shatterglass

by irishais



Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 04:04:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11524185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irishais/pseuds/irishais
Summary: Sleep comes easy for no one after the war. Cid/Edea/Kadowaki, and nightmares.





	shatterglass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ideakureima](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ideakureima/gifts).



 

This is not-----

 

The bedroom is silent, the moonlight creeping through a broken blind that Cid hasn’t gotten around to calling maintenance about yet, a puddle of light cutting across the bedspread and the people ensconced within it. 

 

\--this isn’t--

 

She shifts, finds the warm curve of Yumiko’s back, presses her face there, unconscious in her movements. Magic flickers beneath her skin, tiny static shocks. There’s a quiet noise of discomfort. 

 

\--she can’t stop it _ stop it please stop it _ \--

 

\--

 

Cid wakes first, aware that something is wrong without knowing  _ what  _ or  _ why _ \-- only that the air in the room has changed, from peaceful quiet, to electric, the hair on his arms standing up as he reaches for Edea. 

 

She flinches away, crying out again, and her nails dig deeply into Yumiko’s arm. Cid reaches, grabs, gently pulls her hand away before she can do irreparable damage. It’s going to be one of those nights, isn’t it? 

 

(When isn’t it one of those nights?)

 

\--please, please, not my son--

 

She thrashes, and kicks, and screams. 

 

\--

 

Yumiko Kadowaki sleeps soundly, but rouses quickly, practice from years and years of being on call for whatever emergency Garden has stumbled into any given day of the week, and so when nails break the skin on her soft upper arm, she starts sharply, and nearly falls out of bed.

 

\--no no no no--

 

She turns over, and Cid has Edea in his arms, trying to wake her, trying to calm her down, but they both can taste the static residue of magic in the sterile air conditioned room. She’s fighting her demons-- she’ll be fighting her demons forever, that long line of succession she’s had the misfortune to be at the center of since she was five. 

 

Yumiko finds her glasses on the end table, and Edea comes into better focus, long hair a tangled mess and her nightgown twisted in a way that seems to strangle her. These dreams have gotten worse, and then more so-- the war is over, has been for months now. But still, Edea fights a witch that no one else can see. 

 

Her pulse beats hard against Kadowaki’s fingers, pressed gently into Edea’s wrist, too fast for anyone’s liking and especially hers.

 

“Edie,” Cid murmurs into her ear, a babbling brook of what he thinks is gentle reassurance, nonsense strung together that most times work to break her out of whatever trance he’s in. “Edie, c’mon, c’mon, sweetheart, it’s okay, come back to me--” 

 

The knighting, Kadowaki knows nothing of, but it’s not for lack of trying. She understands the bond is a near-tangible thing between them, but now that Edea has no magic, it’s nothing more than the faintest pull of a string. 

 

She still bets Cid could find Edea in the middle of a labyrinth with little more than a lighter to guide his way. 

 

She reaches, and brushes damp-curled strands of black hair from Edea’s cheeks. “Hey, it’s okay,” she says, her tone encouraging, tugging Edea’s chin so that their eyes meet. “You’re safe, it’s over, you’re here--” 

 

She has no magic, and Edea looks like a frightened child in the moonlight spill. 

 

\--

The world looks old and discolored, a sun-faded picture left to melt in a broken frame. Edea blinks, blinks, tries to bring everything back into focus. 

 

Ultimecia has her son, has her  _ son,  _ ink-dark claws digging into Seifer’s skull,  _ minemINEMINEMINEMINE-- _

 

She needs magic, something, anything, reaches blindly, comes up empty, can’t, nothing, can’t save him,  _ can’t _ \-- seifer, please, no, give him back, give him  _ back!! _

 

Galbadia Garden’s walls are covered in blood, and she has to remember in this moment, struggling in Cid’s arms, heart pounding in her chest, that Seifer is not dead. That he lives in Dollet, with his friends, that she just talked to him the other day on the phone, that he’s not dead, he’s not--

 

_ iwillneverletyouforgetaboutme _ . 

 

Adel and Ultimecia in ominous choir in her head, thousands of others, Rinoa, Ellone, Edea’s own, the voices of every sorceress (kompressed) down into one, a chant that breaks like waves on the shore

 

_ iwillneverlETYOUFORGETABOUT M E E  E-- _

 

the broken blinds rattle against the window in ominous succession.

 

She hurls herself from Cid’s arms, into a ball on the bed, hands tearing at her hair and magic ghosting through her veins-- there is nothing there, there is nothing there, she  **kannot--**

 

Yumiko’s arms come around her, broad and strong from dealing with their horde of murderous youth, bare skin soft and warm, and her cheek rests against Edea’s head. 

 

Cid’s fingers are on her back, smoothing her nightgown down into some semblance of array. “I’m here, I’m right here-- breathe, sweetheart, please, just breathe.” 

 

It’s not enough, his voice, his mantra. 

 

“Edea, can you hear me?” 

 

She can’t, she won’t, her hands clamped over her ears, Ultimecia’s laughter in her ears, Kadowaki’s hands burning into her skin, Cid’s voice like knives. What has she done, what has she done,  _ what has she done? _

 

The blinds rattle harder, and the glass shakes with it-- there is magic, phantom and elusive, but it is always in the air around them, and she wants it, needs it, reaches and grabs it around her like a cloak. 

 

“Edea, I’m going to help you sit up now, okay?” 

 

Warm hands, pulling her upright, and the quilt from the bed is wrapped around Edea’s shoulders. She holds the magic like daggers in her fists, little metal glints of it. A picture on the nightstand knocks itself over from the tremble in the air, and her eyes shut tightly, trying to block it out.

 

_ what have i done what have i done _

 

The mantra on her tongue, wanting to burst out and beg for forgiveness, but all she can do is suck in sharp edges of air, not enough for her aching lungs. Yumiko Kadowaki’s voice remains steady over everything, a safe ship bobbing in a safer harbor. 

 

“Edea, breathe. In, and out. In. Out.” 

 

It hurts, it  _ hurts _ , and she does it anyway, trying to push past the fear the rage the undying knowledge that she has destroyed everything she has ever known  _ forever _ , and this is her punishment. 

 

“You’re doing just fine, baby,” Cid, comforting, in her ear, his mouth against her head, and how can he touch her, how can he love her after everything she has done?

 

There is a crack, and the window breaks beneath the broken blinds, a spiderwebbed one that grows bigger with every sharp inhale. 

 

“That’s good, you’re doing good, you’re doing great,” Yumiko instructs, moving with slow, careful motions to the nightstand and the plastic-wrapped syringe there. Her hand closes over it, and the other finds Edea’s. 

 

“I’m going to give you something to help you calm down, okay?”    
  
Edea trusts her, she has to, she’s kept their children alive for so many years and now keeps her breathing, an anchor in a world gone upside down, where the magic has been scraped out of her veins by a girl less than half her age,  _ the succession must always continue _ , and she has ruined Rinoa’s life, too, ruined Squall’s by proxy-- but she’d ruined Squall’s from the second his future self had shown up in her front yard and told her all about Garden, hadn’t she?

 

Edea can’t breathe, and nods sharply when it seems like Yumiko is waiting for an answer. 

 

The syringe is found and unwrapped and filled, and pushed into the crook of Edea’s elbow, a quick injection of synthesized, stripped down Slow, designed for cases like this. It has an almost instantaneous effect; Edea’s eyes blink open, and she sags like sackcloth in Cid’s arms, even as she is still fighting invisible monsters with hands that claw at Cid’s, leaving red streaks that will heal in time. 

 

\--

 

The air stills, and the magic dissipates, the picture frames on the wall stop rattling, the blinds stop shaking, the spiderweb crack in the glass stops growing. They let out a collective breath.

 

“Good girl,” Cid murmurs again into Edea’s ear, and reaches to grip Yumiko’s hand in gratitude-- this is scary for everyone, and for Kadowaki, who has known Edea since they were barely twenty and wide-eyed kids in Esthar, especially so. 

 

Edea is the strongest person she knows. 

 

No one sleeps easily for the rest of the night. 

  
  



End file.
